


kitsune

by adamantine



Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Animal Traits, Foxes, Kitsune, M/M, Shinto, Tails
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-04
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-07-29 09:00:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7678207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adamantine/pseuds/adamantine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Haru and Rin are both kitsune at the same shrine. Written for SASO.</p><p>ETA: Cleaned up! (smh at certain typos, damn you autocorrect)</p>
            </blockquote>





	kitsune

**Author's Note:**

> I did a little research on kitsune for this and as it turns out descriptions of kitsune vary greatly and wildly so I did what I want, which is why I avoided naming the god they're serving since I didn't want to ground this too much in reality (though realistically it's Inari). Also for the record, this takes place sometime in the past, i.e. not modern times.

“Haru!” Rin shouted, jolting Haru awake from the nap he was having on the shrine’s torii. “Wanna go on a picnic with me?”

Haru rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. Summer was in full bloom. The best time of the year to nap; the sun’s warm rays better than any blanket. He raised his arms above his head, stretching; Rin was standing under the torii with a small basket in his hands. His ears were turned to their sides while his bushy red tail swished anxiously back and forth.

“Okay.” Haru gracefully jumped off of the torii. His geta made a satisfying clack on the stone pavement when he landed.

“Show-off.” Rin’s ears perked up, giving away his true feelings: he was happy to see Haru. “Let’s go.”

More than a century had passed since Haru had met Rin, back when they’d been children. They’d both been assigned to serve at the same shrine of a certain popular god. It was one of the god’s many shrines, newly built in the middle of nowhere.

They couldn’t get along at first. They were always clashing: arguing and fighting over every little thing, making life difficult for the humans that worked at the shrine. The priest in those days used to whack them on the head with his fan almost daily.

“Can’t you two ever behave?” he would say as the two of them bowed their heads to the floor, each claiming the other one was at fault.

Slowly, things got better. Haru couldn’t say for sure what it was, or if it even was any one thing. They both got older, more used to living at the shrine. Haru grudgingly accepted he didn’t dislike Rin after all. They still argued and fought, but it turned into something they did for fun.

For the most part at least.

Haru flicked his tail impatiently. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

They hiked through the forest, away from the trails. Twice, Rin stopped to abruptly change directions. Haru mercilessly complained each time — attacking Rin’s sense of direction, lamenting the fact that his nap had been ruined for nothing — but without any real bite, a fact all too obvious by the way his ears stood up. He was happy to spend the day with Rin, even if it seemed like Rin was leading them in a giant circle around the shrine.

They passed a giant cypress tree. Haru’s sensitive ears twitched. He could hear something, something different from the other sounds of the forest. He strained his ears, trying to make sense of what he was hearing.

“A river?” he asked, uncertain. It didn’t quite sound like the river behind the shrine, but as they neared it he grew more certain it was running water.

“Better! A waterfall!”

Haru’s ears stood up in surprise. There were no waterfalls on any of the maps of the area. Rin must have found it by himself — if to Haru summers meant napping in the sun, to Rin they meant more daylight hours to spend exploring the area around the shrine.

The waterfall wasn’t very large, but there was a sizeable pool of water underneath it. Haru slipped out of his yukata in the blink of an eye, and ran into the water.

It was beautiful. The most beautiful waterfall in the world as far as he was concerned. He had nothing to compare it to, but that didn’t matter. He was sure it was the best one. The next time the shrine’s god stopped by, he would ask him if they could move the shrine to this part of the forest instead. It was inherently superior to the shrine’s current location.

“Watch out!” Rin jumped nto the pool after him. A great wave of water splashed him. He didn’t mind; though he shot Rin a glare for good measure anyway.

* * *

 

“If you don’t get out of the water I’m eating everything without you,” Rin threatened. He’d been trying, unsuccessfully, to get Haru out of the water for ten minutes.

Haru’s stomach rumbled, betraying him. He didn’t want to get out of the water. It wasn’t fair he was born a fox and not a fish.

“Finally,” said Rin. He was lounging on the blanked he’d set out for them, already starting on the food he’d packed.

Haru wrung out his tail over Rin’s head.

“Hey!” Rin screeched, moving to avoid getting wet.

“Move.” Haru said, swatting Rin’s tail away and claiming his spot.

They ate without clothes on, letting the sun dry their thick tails. Rin’s was a beautiful mixture of reds that seemed to shine in the sun. Haru’s was a deep black, with almost a blue sheen to it. Being kitsune, they were shapeshifters able to appear as humans, foxes, or somewhere in-between. That in-between appearance came most natural to them: human bodies with fox ears and a fox tail. It came with the benefit of only certain humans being able to see them, like those who worked at the shrine. There was something about the supernatural most humans rejected. Their eyes passed over things that didn’t make sense to them.

“Pass me a berry.” Rin nudged his shoulder. Haru turned to see Rin on his side in the picture of laziness; the berries were closer to him than to Haru.

“No.”

Rin’s tail flicked against him, whacking his side. His soft fur was dangerously close to being ticklish.

“Don’t do that,” Haru warned.

“Or what?” Rin flicked his tail again, hitting Haru with all the force he could muster.

“Stop that.” Another whack, and then another. Haru’s breath hitched as Rin’s fur trailed against him; his ears flattened in annoyance.

“Make me,” Rin challenged.

Haru kicked him, lightly, and Rin laughed, his tail still smacking against Haru without remorse. Haru pushed him over, which Rin found even more amusing, laughing louder as he pushed Haru back.

In an instant they were rolling off the blanket, pushing and shoving on the grass, the type of play fighting they did as children.

Haru struggled to pin down Rin’s arms. He threw his weight against him, straddling him to keep him from rolling away.

Rin was breathing hard. Haru could feel each breath he took, the rise and fall of his chest pressing against him. His lips were stained red from the berries; Haru wondered if his were too.

Rin’s tail was splayed next to him. Haru felt the ghost of it on his side. His hands itched to touch it.

Haru reached out. Rin’s eyes locked on him, waiting to see what Haru would do.

Softness, an unbelievable softness, engulfed his hand. The feeling should have been familiar to him from grooming his own tail, but somehow it wasn’t, somehow it was different: Rin’s tail was a little bushier, the fur a little softer. Haru brushed his fingers through it, marveling at how well Rin took care of it. He hadn’t noticed, he hadn’t been paying attention. When did Rin groom himself? How did he do it? Haru tugged on it in vexation.

IRin’s ears flattened in submission and his lips parted to form an expression that was a a mixture of surprise and pleasure. It was so unexpected to Haru that he wondered if he’d mistakened the reason for Rin’s reaction. He tugged on Rin’s tail again, a little harder, not quite expecting anything to happen.

Rin’s hips jerked up, startling Haru.

Oh.

_Oh._

Haru’s face flushed in embarrassment.

“We should head back to the shrine,” he said, scrambling off of Rin. He searched for his clothes, wanting, needing to cover himself up. His body was beginning to react, and it seemed imperative to keep Rin from noticing.

“I—I’ll pack up,” Rin said.

Haru nodded, his back to Rin, not sure if he was more afraid of looking at Rin or of Rin looking at him. He wanted to apologize, but also didn’t. What was wrong with him? He knew perfectly well how strange it felt when his tail was yanked, though he’d never associated the feeling with pleasure, not exactly, but perhaps it was different when it wasn’t an accident, when it was another person, the pulling more gentle—

For once Haru felt too hot under the summer sun, sweating in his thin yukata as he waited for Rin to finish packing up.

* * *

 

Haru shivered under his thick winter comforter. Kitsune had a higher tolerance for extreme temperatures than humans, but even they had their limits. The snow storm outside was colder than Haru could comfortably tolerate. He wasn't in danger of freezing to death like humans were, but he certainly could get frostbite if he wasn’t careful.

”I-I-I’m co-co-cold,” Rin whined from the futon next to him, his teeth chattering. The room they were in had no heating and little insulation against the elements. Normally Haru and Rin didn’t sleep in it, choosing instead to sleep outdoors, but that wasn’t an option tonight. 

Haru made a sound of agreement. “We’re the guardians of this shrine. Why don’t we have a hearth in our room?”

“Be-be-be-cause then you’d spe-spe-spend all day and a-a-all night curled up next to it,” Rin countered.

“So?” Haru didn’t see a problem with that.

Rin snorted. “I-i-if you’re so cold, you can a-a-always shift into fox form.”

Haru wrinkled his nose. Being in fox form was inconvenient — no opposable thumbs and being significantly smaller made it difficult to do simple tasks, like opening doors or covering yourself with a blanket, but it would make him warmer.

Suddenly, an idea struck him.

He closed his eyes and shifted, feeling himself grow smaller and smaller until he was a black fox. When he opened his eyes the world was dark — he was trapped in a pile of clothes, under his blanket. He wriggled himself free.

The world was warmer, but it could still be improved.

He nudged Rin’s comforter.

“Wha-wha-what are you—“

“Let me in, I’m cold.” He nuzzled Rin’s hand, trying to look innocent. When that didn’t work, he bit him.

“He-he-hey! Fine! I’ll let you in.” He pulled up his comforter and made room for Haru.

Haru ignored the space he made and instead chose to rest on Rin’s chest, his head at Rin’s neck, sticking out of the comforter. He closed his eyes, content.

“Much better,” he said. Rin’s body temperature was better than any hearth could ever be.

He feel asleep, his body relaxed.

* * *

 

The wind picked up, knocking a branch off of a tree. It banged against the wall, startling Haru awake. It was late at night, dawn still hours away. He wasn’t sure when, but at some point in his sleep he’d shifted back into his normal, in-between form, which meant he was half on top of Rin, naked.

Rin murmured something.

“What?” Haru asked.

“Heavy.” He struggled under Haru’s weight.

“Oh. I guess I shifted back when I was asleep.” He carefully removed his limbs from Rin, but made no attempt to move back to his futon. His eyes adjusted to the dark, letting him see much more than a human could.

Rin sat up. “Ow, my neck. I slept on it all wrongly thanks to you.” His nemaki had come loose and was slipping off his shoulder. The small amount of flesh exposed somehow looked more indecent to Haru than if Rin hadn’t been wearing anything at all.

“Rin.” Haru’s heart was pounding in his ears. He mind flashed to the summer, to moment he touched Rin’s tail. It was a memory he tried to ignored and yet held on to desperately, never wanting to forget the softness he’d felt. 

“Yeah?” His ears were wary. He had picked up on the strangeness in Haru’s voice.

“This summer, when I touched your tail, how did it feel?”

Both Rin's ears and eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Why are you asking that now?”

“I want to know.”

“It felt… I don’t know. I don’t remember.” He turned his head away. His cheeks took on a darker shade; Haru's night vision couldn't see the exact color but he was certain it was at least a nice shade of pink.

“You do remember. Tell me.” Haru’s tail flicked under the covers, restless, demanding.

Rin looked at him, searching his expression for something, and then spoke. “It felt good,” he said, his voice quiet but firm.

Haru pushed the covers aside, exposing himself and Rin, though Rin was still clothed, however lightly. Rin’s tail was behind him; Haru reached for it and pulled.

Rin made a sound, almost a whimper. Any trace of sleepiness Haru had vanished at the sound. It stirred something primal in him.

“Rin, lean against me.” He sat down, motioning for Rin to come to his lap.

Rin nodded. “Okay,” he said, his voice tight.

He straddled Haru’s left leg, tail straight up and ass in the air, and leaned against Haru, his forehead resting on Haru’s shoulder. His ears flattened into to that same submissive posture they’d been in during the summer. Seeing Rin’s submission brought out instincts he hadn’t known of: a desire to claim Rin, to touch him, mark him in some way, to see him writhe in pleasure from something Haru had done.

“Ready?” Haru asked.

“Yes.”

Haru pushed up Rin’s nemaki, exposing his ass to the elements, and moved it off of Rin’s tail. All of their clothing was specially made with holes for their tails to go through. Haru pushed Rin’s tail out the hole, sliding the cloth ever further up.

“Hurry.” Rin pushed his ass further up. His impatience satisfied something in Haru.

He grabbed Rin’s tail where it met his skin and pulled.

Rin let out a low whine. His nails, too sharp for a human, dug into Haru’s chest. The pain cleared Haru’s mind.

“Sorry,” Rin said, his nails retracting. He’d lost control and partly shifted.

Haru pulled again, harder, testing Rin’s reactions. Rin hissed; his cock was hard, Haru could feel it grazing his thigh.

“How hard should I pull?”

“Not any harder than that.”

“Okay.”

Haru pulled on Rin’s tail once more, careful not to pull too hard. Again he pulled, over and over, each pull gentle but firm.  With his other hand he played with Rin’s ass, fondling it, even tapping it lightly, making Rin’s hips rise higher in response.

“Haru,” Rin’s claws were digging into his shoulder again, “I’m going to come.”

“Do it.” Haru twisted his head to see Rin’s face, wanting to memorize his expression.

Rin back arched as he came; Haru felt the warmth of it run down his thigh.

Rin collapsed against him, his tail curling around his body. The smell of him triggered new instincts in Haru: pride that his mate was satiated, frustration that his scent was missing. It should have been there, covering him, letting the world know he was the one that had taken care of Rin.

He nibbled on Rin’s ear in annoyance.

“Hey, that tickles.”

“Does it?” Haru asked, surprised.

“Yeah? I think. It feels strange at least.”

“Hmm. You think. Maybe we should make sure.”

Rin sat up straighter, until he was at eye level with Haru.

“You have pretty eyes, have I ever told you that?” he said, changing the subject.

Haru shook his head.

“Well you do. They’re as clear as water.” Haru was not sure what that meant, but he quickly stopped thinking about it. Rin pulled him in for a kiss. He was clumsy, his strength not fully recovered.  They fell, collapsing into a heap of limbs and tails on the futon.

Rin laughed. It was a beautiful sound, even better than the roar of a waterfall.

Haru smiled, every part of him warm from happiness.


End file.
